


Voodoo In My Blood

by Assido_Mina



Category: Persona 5, Persona Series
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Character Turned Into Vampire, F/M, He's just kind of a shit, M/M, Mugging, No Mementos, Polyamory, Polythieves (Persona 5), Rating Likely to Change, We talkin' daywalkers son, semi-delinquint Akira
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-24
Updated: 2019-04-24
Packaged: 2020-01-25 21:49:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18583252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Assido_Mina/pseuds/Assido_Mina
Summary: Being booted from your home is bad enough, but being sent to an entirely different city is another thing entirely. This is a reality that one Akira Kurusu has to adapt to, and one that he is PREPARED to adapt to. A court order says that he doesn't have much choice.What one finds slightly more difficult to get used to is a thirst for blood and innate knowledge of something brewing beneath the city's surface, something that threatens the very future of humanity as we know it.And to think, he was prepared to just serve out his probation in peace. Being a teenager... really bites.





	Voodoo In My Blood

**Author's Note:**

> I got some notes at the end :3

When you travel from the country into the city, sometimes it strikes you just how… much of everything there is. You go from open fields and shimmering rivers to metal pylons and concrete streets. From lush green to stagnant grey.

You go from everyone knowing your name, to nobody knowing your name. Of all the things that Akira had been hoping for a year ago, that hadn’t been one of them, but now here he was on a train to Tokyo that was filling up more by the minute, starting off empty and ending up with so many people squeezed in beside him that he could hardly breath through the heat. It was a shitty welcome, but it hadn’t been as shitty as the goodbye he’d gotten.

“Excuse me.” Akira looked up, squinting his eyes at the salaryman staring at him impatiently. “Would you mind giving up the seat?”

“Why?” He pinched the bridge of his nose between his fingers, the flickering lights doing wonders for the headache that he’d already been nursing for the last few days. The annoyed huff of breath in response to his refusal set his teeth on edge.

“Have you heard of respecting your elders?”

“Have you heard about not bothering strangers? Please stop talking.”

It did the trick of getting the salaryman to leave in search of another seat, but it had the side effect of making every pair of eyes turn to him with open suspicion. As though not wanting to get up for someone rude was something only delinquents did. On any other day he might have given it up with no issue, he knew how taxing long train rides could be. But something about the way that he was standing, the way he had asked with that _tone,_ it reminded Akira too much of how he had ended up here in the first place, and what he didn’t want today were _reminders._

Though he’d been in Tokyo for less than thirty seconds if the scenery told him anything, he’d already broken his rule of not being noticed by anyone. Maybe he _should_ have a few reminders.

The train ride couldn’t have ended sooner, but once he did he was immediately wishing for the solitude of the train car again. Everything was so loud, he could feel the vibration of the cars, of the people _talking_ right in his bones, it was all he could do to not just clamp his hands over his ears and try to drown it out by screaming. But the initial shock passed, and with it so too did his thoughts of home. The country wasn’t his home anymore, it hadn’t been for months by now, somewhere in this… mess was a new home for him. It was time for him to see what shack his parents had decided to discard him for the next year.

It took a while to push through the crowds and get onto the next train, somehow even more cramped than the first had been, but soon enough he was stepping out at Yongen-Jaya station and breathing in the not so fresh city air. It wasn’t how he had expected the introduction to start, he hadn’t even gotten any instructions other than to walk to a nearby cafe, but he supposed that if someone had been there to shove him into a car and lecture him right after getting off the train then he would have been a _lot_ more annoyed. At least here he had the chance to go at his own pace, to try and work out some sense of acceptance at his new circumstances. And then he was standing outside Leblanc, and it all came rushing back to him.

“Let’s just get this over with,” He sighed, bowing his head lightly and stepping through the door. The patrons inside looked up at the bell dinging, an elderly couple and the slightly less elderly barista who seemed perplexed that someone of his age would be going out of his way to visit a coffee shop in an alleyway.

“I’ll be with you in a minute,” The barista said, finishing up the couple’s payment and seeing them off with a smile. Even Akira managed a smile at them as they passed him by, holding the door open until they were clear of the shop, it was about as civil as he’d managed to be the whole day. “Now, how can I help you?”

Akira turned back, smile falling from his face and shifting back into the blank mask he always wore to disguise his annoyance. “Sojiro Sakura?”

“That’s me.”

“Congratulations,” He said, holding his hands out, “I’m the criminal you ordered, sign here please.”

Sojiro’s eyes widened, glancing around the shop before looking up at the calendar, letting out a breath that was equal parts relieved and annoyed, “That’s today? Well at least you waited until the customers were gone before you said something like that.”

“Mmhmm.” Akira walked in and leaned against the counter, thumb still toying with the strap of his bag. “You are my guardian right? I didn’t accidentally get myself kidnapped?”

“Yea, that’s me. Don’t really know _why_ I agreed to it but this is your new home for the next year,” His voice lowered to a warning, “Screw up _once_ and you’re out of here and in jail, do you understand?”

“Yep, yeah I understand,” Akira sighed, before his head snapped back up, “Wait, here? As in, _here_ here?”

Sojiro nodded, stepping around the counter and waving his hand impatiently over his shoulder. “Follow me.”

Akira hadn’t expected that things could get much worse, he was already being kicked across an entire prefecture to live with someone he’d never met before in his life, but apparently the universe was just determined to prove him wrong at every point that it could. A room in a stranger’s home would have been bad enough, but a dusty, dirty attic above a cafe seemed to be a worse option that he hadn’t considered before. For a minute he was considering just walking back into a jail cell, at least that would probably be clean.

“Here’s your new home, treat it good or it’s gone.” Sojiro looked over at him, raising his eyebrow before shaking his head. “Do you understand?”

Akira nodded after a moment to wipe his eyes, the dust already irritating him beyond measure. “Do you have a mop?”

“Yeah, why?”

“So that I don’t choke to death in my sleep tonight, why do you think?”

Sojiro took one last look at him before moving back down the stairs, offering only a quiet “Smartass” to end the conversation. They didn’t exchange any words when he brought up a box of cleaning supplies, nor did they say anything to each other than a simple goodbye and a warning to not leave the cafe until the morning before Sojiro closed up for the night. For hours the only sound that existed in the attic was the near silent scrubbing and wiping of the cloth against the dusty old wood, and the occasional coughing fit when Akira disturbed dust that had been untouched for what must have been years.

“There,” He said, collapsing back onto the hard mattress once he’d finally tossed the cloth off to the side, the room not quite sparkling but undeniably cleaner than it had been when he’d first walked up. “Home shit home.”

The trip and the cleaning must have taken more out of him than he’d thought, his eyes falling shut and his legs curling up to his chest, sleep claiming him until the moon was shining high above and draping pale blades of light across his sleeping form. Not a single creature was stirring, not the birds, not the neighborhood cats, not even traffic was passing by the nearby streets.

It was in this peculiar silence that he woke again, a pressure building in the back of his head that wouldn’t go away no matter how much he rubbed at it. Leaning on his elbow and looking around the attic, he squinted his eyes to try and see through the darkness that had claimed every inch of the space, certain that he saw something moving around the staircase before turning back to look at him, two red points staring right into his soul until he sat up further and rubbed at his eyes, all signs that anything had been there to begin with vanishing along with his desire to sleep.

“What the fuck was that…” He whispered to himself, placing a hand over his racing heart and breathing a sigh of relief, “Nothing… it was nothing…”

He didn’t get anymore sleep that night, instead he sat up until the sun crested over the horizon, the animals coming alive once more.

 

“You’re awake.” Sojiro looked up in surprise, stirring at the pot in front of him. “I thought you’d take advantage of the day off before you have to go to school.”

“Didn’t sleep much,” He answered, “Not used to the city.”

“Ah.” Sojiro nodded, spooning out a bowl of curry before setting it in front of Akira. “It takes some getting used to, but you’ll get used to it. I know we were both on edge yesterday but… eat will you? This doesn’t have to be difficult.”

Akira inclined his head at the peace offer, but he was too tired to offer his usual sarcastic response. Right now he was glad to just have something offered to him without being accompanied with suspicion or disapproval. “This smells pretty good, recipe or packet?”

“All my own recipe,” He replied, taking his own bowl and sitting on the other side of the counter, “Been cooking it for a long time too. You do any cooking?”

“I have before, made a curry once that’d be a real experience.”

“That good huh?”

“Oh it’ll kill you, but it’d be an experience when it happened.” Akira smirked around his spoon, before looking up at the clock. “I’m guessing that you’ll want me out of here before anyone civilized shows up?”

“I…” Sojiro placed his spoon down, leaning closer. “What makes you say that?”

“My parents told me not to make any trouble, and apparently hanging around would count as trouble.”

He sighed, shaking his head. “They… were right, it’d be best if you weren’t here during the day. Too many questions if people see you coming in and out of the attic.”

“I figured.” Spooning up the last of his curry, Akira wiped his mouth and stood from the counter, picking up the bag that he’d already packed up in preparation for having to leave. “Don’t want anyone to find out you’ve got a kid living in the attic rather than the house, they might call the police.”

“We don’t want that do we?”

“Nope, if you get in trouble then I go right back to jail, just like everyone said I should to begin with.” Looping the strap of his bag over his shoulders, he scratched at the corner of his mouth before offering an awkward thanks for the food.

Sojiro watched him go, humming to himself and preparing to open the cafe. “What did they tell that kid…”

 

The morning introduction had at least been easier to swallow, but Sojiro was still a complete stranger, he wasn’t going to be able to break bread so easily with someone who was only barely taking care of him for money. Maybe in time he would come to surprise him, but given the events of the last few months Akira wasn’t exactly going out of his way to place any trust in any of the adults around him, the last time he’d done that he’d been thrown into a holding cell.

And since he’d been booted from what was supposedly his home for the remaining hours of the day, he had precious little to do other than wander the streets and get trapped in his own head, a prospect that had him wishing for a batting cage or some other outlet where he could beat something until he got the frustration out. He’d heard that there was a batting cage near the cafe, but by the time he remembered that he was standing at the train station and waiting in line, he didn’t want to have to walk back into Yongen-Jaya so soon after being booted out.

Which was how he ended up in the main street of Shibuya with barely an idea of where he wanted to go, pushing himself through crowds of people all with a different destination in mind, suffocating at the heat and noise that instinctually made him feel like he was being crushed underneath their weight. He wasn’t much a fan of the crowds, and he didn’t see that changing anytime soon, he just hoped that he could get used to it fast before it became an issue.

The first thing that struck him was just how… uniform everything seemed, even through all of its chaos. Though the people flowed in five different directions at once, when you watched them go they all seemed to be heading to or exiting the same five destinations, just making the rounds with the same goals in mind, just in a different order. Just going through the motions, before they went back to apartments that likely all looked the same as well, working jobs that made them part of a crowd rather than an individual, just one more drop in the shapeless ocean that was the Tokyo lifestyle.

At first glance it… almost revolted him, that idea of giving up the sense of being someone for being some _thing,_ another cog that just kept the gears ticking until it could be replaced. But he wasn’t blind to the fact that in this mass he wasn’t being thrown aside or judged for his past, he could just fade away into the crowd and live quietly if he just did what he was told, if he didn’t get involved in anything that wasn’t any of his business to get involved in.

Which with his luck, meant that he heard a shout as soon as he breathed in, head snapping to the source of the sound down a nearby alleyway just as several others did as well. It was obvious what it was, he’d been through school, he’d grown up with friends, he knew what a noise of pain sounded like, and the others likely did as well. But they turned away, expressions shifting and showing that they’d already long forgotten about the plight of someone that they didn’t even know, floating back into the crowd as he dearly wished that he could as well.

“Come on…” He sighed, rubbing a hand through his hair and digging his nails into his scalp, “It’s none of your business, just keep going.”

Yet his feet didn’t move, even as his nails bit into the skin of his palm hard enough to break the skin and his teeth clenched so tightly that he could feel the pain all the way up in his ears. “Not again, don’t do this to yourself again…”

“Hey, get the fuck off me!”

One foot in front of the other, Akira marched deeper into the alley, slapping his hand harshly across his face to try and stop himself to no avail. At least he could give himself a reminder of how stupid he was being.

What he saw when he peeked his head around the corner wasn’t what he’d been expecting, he was expecting some tourist who’d gotten snatched up, maybe for doing something stupid like wandering down alleyways when there was obvious danger, but instead he saw… a delinquent? Perhaps that was too harsh at a glance, but there generally weren’t many other conclusions to draw when someone had obviously bleached blond hair and half a school uniform draped over themselves. He didn’t know what the Shujin uniform looked like exactly, but he was fairly sure that it didn’t involve bright red t-shirts.

“The hell do you want from me?” The delinquent spat, glaring up at one of the thugs holding him against the wall, the beginnings of a bruise on his cheek telling Akira that their talk hadn’t been especially voluntary. “I ain’t done nothin’ to you guys!”

“Yer an easy mark,” The shorter of the thugs cackled, thumping him in the stomach with his elbow and holding him up by his hair, “You want it to be over? Cough up some money!”

“I-I don’t have any money, I’m a student!” His eyes flicked between the two in front of him, trying to get his point across clearly. “There’s no money!”

“Hmm… No money huh?” The shorter, clearly the leader, clicked his tongue, and instantly Akira knew that he couldn’t just leave. “Cut him.”

“Wha-” He choked off as the taller held him by his throat, flicking out a switchblade and leveling it at his stomach, clearly intending to push it in as his captive scrambled around. “Wait, wait wait!”

Akira swept forward, feet not making a sound as he knelt down quickly and grabbed up a fallen bottle, flipping it around in his hand and swinging it down onto the thug’s skull, hearing something crack and hoping that it was the bottle. The thug dropped the knife instantly and started turning, blood already starting to drip down his forehead as Akira swung again, shattering it into his cheek and dropping him to the ground limply, leaving the three still standing looking blankly at one another before any of them thought to speak.

“You-” The leader was cut off with a meaty yelp, his mark’s fist smashing right into his nose and bouncing him back against the wall, a kick into his ribs making him double over in pain and moan weakly. Looking at the scene in front of him, it suddenly struck Akira that this was probably a serious violation of his probation.

“T-Thanks man,” The delinquent said, spitting blood out onto the ground and holding his hand out, “I’m Ryuji, how about you?”

“I’m…” Akira stared down at the two moaning thugs, blood on the ground and a shattered bottle in his hand. “I’m on probation. Fuck.”

_“Probation?”_ Ryuji looked around them, weighing up the odds of being saved from a couple of criminals by another criminal. He had about a thousand questions to ask, including ‘Who are you?’ and ‘What do you mean probation?’ but at the sound of the two thugs starting to stir he made a choice that a split second thought decided was the right one.

“Screw it,” He said, grabbing Akira by the hand and dragging him deeper into the alley, heading to the main street and away from a likely stabbing, “You can tell me more later!”

“Y-Yeah,” Akira said, looking down at their hands and letting himself be carried along, “I… guess I will.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> So here's the beginnings of my first long fic for Persona 5, I'm excited to get started! Just wanted to outline a few spoiler free things for anyone on the fence.
> 
> The rating is likely to change to explicit in the future, I can't really help myself and come on, it's vampires. I can do some sweet stuff with that. The focus for the foreseeable future is Akira/Ryuji/Ann, but I'm likely to add others to the mix in the future, likely just members of the PT but who knows right? You probably also noticed that he isn't actually a vampire yet, that's all in good time!
> 
> Also I'm going to be writing Akira as more... surly than usual. Mainly because for a personal interpretation I played him as being deeply frustrated with his circumstances (I made sure to always go to the batting cages because I figured he needed to work anger out) so that'll be the general type of character he's going to be right now. He's also a sarcastic little shit, so I hope that I can keep your interest!
> 
> Also here's my [Twitter](https://twitter.com/AssidoMina)! I drew some art of Ryuji that I'm pretty happy with after so long not drawing, so check that out if you want! Or don't, no pressure :3  
> Other than that, I hope you enjoy what I've got coming!


End file.
